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April comes in like one hot beast

After one of the warmest Marches on record, April is coming on like June. Temperatures Wednesday are expected to flirt with 90, making this apparently the warmest start to an April in Philadelphia history.

After one of the warmest Marches on record, April is coming on like June.

Temperatures Wednesday are expected to flirt with 90, making this apparently the warmest start to an April in Philadelphia history.

Tuesday's official high, 87 at Philadelphia International Airport, tied a record set in 1929 and matched in 1942.

Assuming Wednesday's forecast works out, the average temperature for the first seven days of the month will come in around 65 degrees. The current standard for the first week in April is 61.3, set in the aforementioned 1929.

All the warmth is the result of bone-dry high pressure to the south that is promoting warm winds from the southwest, said Lee Robertson, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service office in Mount Holly.

The winds are especially dry and warm because they are descending mountain slopes, as opposed to coming off the cool Atlantic Ocean, he added.

Despite all those record rains - not to mention the 61/2 feet of snow that fell during the winter - it has been so dry that the weather service has issued a "fire watch" for Wednesday afternoon.

Temperatures will make a run at 80 Thursday, but then the summer party will be over for a while as a front comes through.

Friday will be about 30 degrees cooler than Wednesday.